A.M. Roundup: Talking about ‘Moreland-related matters’

Good morning! The Rangers kept their hopes alive, or at least avoided the indignity of a sweep, beating the L.A. Kings 2-1 Wednesday night at the Garden.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo is in New York City today.

On to the headlines:

Albany County District Attorney David Soares and other members of Gov. Cuomo’s disbanded Moreland Commission met Wednesday in Soares’ office under a veil of secrecy. One commission member said the panel discussed “Moreland-related matters,” but would not elaborate. (TU)

A protest by advocates for the disabled resulted in 17 arrests when activists refused to leave the chamber after session adjourned. (TU)

The incident also marked another chapter in yogurt’s unexpectedly dramatic journey to becoming New York’s official state snack. (GNS)

Maybe he’s learned his lesson this time: Assemblyman Micah Kellner just can’t give up on interns despite sanctions denying them to him. Now Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver is shutting down his Albany and district offices. (TU)

In moves to fight heroin addiction, Cuomo announced changes that will nearly double the number of State Police narcotics investigators and launch an awareness campaign on college campuses. (AP)

The Senate overwhelmingly approved a bill that would require higher-ed institutions to report violent felonies or missing persons cases within 24 hours. (TU)

About that Senate Dems reunification plan: “You go to political conventions, they get very political, and that actually, I believe, hurts government. Especially the way I do it,” Gov. Cuomo said Wednesday. He said he wants to finish the session before engaging on the issue. (SoP)

Unionized employees at the Albany County Nursing Home approved changes to their contracts that include 1 percent-per-year pay increases and changes to employees’ schedules — modifications expected to bring an estimated savings of $1.5 million per year. (TU)

The East Greenbush Town Board will vote again today on whether to support a casino proposal. (TU)

Congressman Charles Rangel and his challengers, state Senator Adriano Espaillat and the Rev. Michael Walrond, sparred Wednesday night in their final televised debate ahead of the June 24 primary. (NY1)

Sens. Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand have taken a stand in the looming artisanal cheese battle. (TU)

Columbia Development, one of Albany’s biggest real estate developers, is going to become a tenant of the SUNY College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering’s new ZEN building. (TU)

35 Responses

2% raises for M/C employees? But they are more like 9% behind. They lost 3% and 4% raises under Paterson and didn’t get the 2% in April like the other State Employees. So this 2% raise for M/C’s catches them up to this year’s raises, but what about the 3 and 4% raises lost under Paterson?

All I can say is that Gov. Cuomo and his administration is the product of “too many high priced chiefs and not enough working warriors.” There has never been so many bureaucratic rules and regulations and bureaucrats with far too much time on their hands as with this current administration. The real workforce behind the State is becoming overwhelmed in this bureaucracy and is bailing out in droves do to the overwhelming number of Cuomo’s hired henchman all coming to town waiting and wanting to prove their bureaucratic worthiness at taxpayer expense. What will remain will mainly be those high priced Cuomo loyalist doing very little effort at a premium dollar, and the State becoming more in disrepair than ever before. How that will save the State money in the long run remains far beyond my level of comprehension. Time will tell what this will really end up costing the State and New York State taxpayers in the long run. I fear the worse, but people are seduced and mesmerized by him for now.

2% for M/C workers and they are supposed to be happy with that? Oh I’m sure there are those who will say at least it’s something. Well here’s the analogy….I guess if you order a salad and they just brought you one shred of lettuce but you paid for a whole meal and they said they would give you the rest shortly but 6 long years later you were still waiting, you would not be very happy or fulfilled. Especially when all the others you dined with received their portions promptly. I don’t know how else to explain it other than to say it’s just not fair, ethical or right and a whole helluva lot more important to M/Cs since this has ruined their pensions, morale, and created hostility in the workplace. Cuomo has got to go…vote him out!

I hate to say I told you so. I called it months ago that the Governor would find it in his tiny little heart to give us the 2% raises. This totally takes the steam out of any efforts to get the M/C pay issue resolved and on par with the unions. Now that he has so “Graciously” allowed for 2% raises, he can say he addressed the pay issue and gave the same raises that the unions got (he will leave out that iut was for this year only). Now any efforts to get the remaining 7%% back will be met with we are beiung greedy and we already got raises, etc. That’s it my fellow M/C’s, that is all we are gonna get. The comission bill will of course be vetoed, and the other bills will never make it to his desk, and since the 2% is given now the pay restoration bill is now inaccurate and would have to be re-written to compensate for this 2%, otherwise he will veto it because it’s inaccuracy. It may be several years more beofre we see another raise, and they will only be in keeping with what the unions get moving forward. That 7% will be a bone of contention for the remainder of the governor’s time in office.

Preet may be the federal prosecutor for the southern district of New York but David Soares is the DA of Albany County where state government is located. It only makes sense that he review all of the information prepared for turn over to the Feds before it actually happens.

The Cuomo administration is poised to approve 2 percent raises for management/confidential employees, a non-unionized class of state workers who have gone five years without broad-based raises; longevity and “step” increases are also in the offing. (TU
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Scrooge McCuomo comes through!

Unionized employees at the Albany County Nursing Home approved changes to their contracts that include 1 percent-per-year pay increases and changes to employees’ schedules — modifications expected to bring an estimated savings of $1.5 million per year. (TU)

Excerpted from the article above:

“These contract modifications will bring an estimated savings of $1.5 million per year. County Executive Dan McCoy’s administration has repeatedly said taxpayers lose as much as $1 million per month running the facility.(TU)”

Not once has County Executive Mccoy put data on the table to prove this assertion. He has lied repeatedly about the financial condition of the home, and County Comptroller MIchael Connors proved it with his own interim audit of the facility a year ago. McCoy is not to be trusted.

Why do the Moreland Act Commissioners need special counsel? And they retained upstate and downstate high priced counsel at that. Shouldn’t the AG represent them? After all, they are Deputy Attorneys General, designated by the Schneidafighta!!!!!

City planners gathered in Albany this week to imagine life after elevated highways. (CapNY)
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And wouldn’t it be nice to have trollies return to inner city main arteries rather than big, cumbersome buses.
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These city planners should be meeting with their local city attorneys
to see if they can bring claims against the state and federal government for having spent 100’s of million, perhaps billions, to build roadways into and through cities to convenience the suburbanites who live in green pastures but work in affected cities. These roadways have cut off entire neighborhoods from their brethren, creating isolated, crime ridden, racial ghettos, and blight that is beyond repair, in places like Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse and Albany.

Each of the cities noted above ranks in the top-10, nationally, of cities that have the highest percentages of poverty, the lowest performing schools, and lowest real estate values, thanks to the elevated highway and access roads built by agencies of the state and federal governments, going back 50 years. Only Detroit and Cleveland outrank them. It is time these levels of government to be held accountable for their “Buck Rogers” mental imagery and follow through and correct what they did wrong.

The Barnes and Noble outing had all the production of a campaign rally.

I would put the chances of HRC running for POTUS as 50/50.
It will depend on the results of the Nov. midterm election; the popularity of Obama by next year; and the opinions of Bill and Chelsea.

She has a huge base of support among women who see her as
the best opportunity to crack the glass ceiling in the Oval Office. Does the office have a glass ceiling? Don’t believe so, as it would be a national security issue.

I would like to see her competing with a progressive populist, like Eliz. Warren or former Montana gov. Brian Schweitzer; and throw in the social democrat Bernie Sanders. Now these 3 in a debate would be worth watching.

HRC is the hedge fund, Wall Street favorite of the Dem. Financial community; and also of the Hollywood liberal elite.

She is not a populist; and would be somewhat of a neo-con interventionist on foreign policy.

She has a lot of baggage and the campaign against her would not be gentle.

The interview with Diane Sawyer was very disappointing.

Sawyer was supposed to interview her for an hour, but when commercials and ABC videos are considered, the actual one-on-one was less than ½ hour.
Thanks for the DVR allowing filtering out the ads and videos.
Sawyer was a poor interviewer; looked frightened ; smiled very little and overall, made Barbara Walters’ interviews seem heavy

(Cuomo said he isn’t “overly optimistic” on what will get done before the legislative session ends. Speaker Silver, for his part, hopes to get a minimum wage increase approved. (CapNY))
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This is a sad commentary on the role of the IDC.
What has the IDC done to justify them joining the coalition with the Senate GOP?

hawkny,
trollies, aka trolleys or light rail, are an expensive and ineffective alternative to buses which are much more flexible in terms of where they can take passengers. Typically an area will build a light rail system, be forced to subsidize the bejeebers out of it thereby reducing the funding available for busses and thus hurting the folks that most depend on mass transit. A losers game. Everyone loses.
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M/C employees were treated unfairly by the governor and their other elected representatives lifted hardly a finger to help out. I’m sympathetic. However, it’s reached the point where I’ve had about enough of the crybaby posts. I’m sure there will be a couple more today, tomorrow and the next day. Nobody on this blog can help you. Sound off with someone who can.

@Scott- Point taken, however you are overlooking the many, many lower-grade, lower-paid clerical and secretarial staff that are in the M/C classification due to the nature of their work. They also have not received raises in the last five years… They, at least, should be made whole with the union pay scale. If King Cuomo had any heart at all… but, no, with him it’s all about the headline. Some newspaper would spread the lie that M/C employees were getting a “windfall” 7% raise…
He only stands up for himself.

There are a few things that I find troublsome regardng the secret meeting between Soares and the Moreland Commission members. One, exactly who is paying for the legal fees to retain the high priced lawyers representing the members of the Moreland Commission, and exactly who hired these attorneys, and how ? The commission has been disbanded by order of the Governor, so how could it hire, let alone pay for, legal represntation after the governor had disbanded it ? By what auothority cold they do that ? Also, are these lawyers represnting the entire Moreland Commission (and again, if so, how did that happen, and who is paying the lawyers fees) or are the lawyers represnting individual members of the Moreland Commission ? If so, that flys in the face of the Governor’s assertion that legal advice is approrpiate to help wind down the affairs of the MOreland Commission. Also, Preet has publicly announced, and commenced, a formal investigation into the activites of the Moreland Commission and the Governor’s role in the Commission,an investigation complete with subpoenas being issued. Given the fact that there is an active Federal investigation underway, is it ethically proper for Soares to meet with the subjects of that investigation ? Could he not be seen as potentially interfering with a federal investigation ?

Assemblyman Micah Kellner just can’t give up on interns despite sanctions denying them to him.
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@TU – why haven’t you provided any coverage of rallys led by female assembly representatives and women’s organizations against the seemingly unending mistreatment at the hands of their male counterparts?

a 2% raise for M/C’s 6 months into 2014 after all of this time is an complete insult to those who have been struggling for the last 5-6 years. There is no M/C who could or should be happy about this. As a natter of fact they should be outraged. This comes out to be maybe 30-40 dollars more in our checks after taxes. With PEF in negotiations and CSEA behind them next year, we are destined to fall back to the 9% that we are currently behind. I know Mr. Cuomo thinks we are stupid but does he think that we are stupid enough to accept this measly raise after 6 years of nothing including a jump in helath care costs and a furlough?? No sir, we will not forget, and we will not accept this. As slick as you think you are you must be the stupid one if you beleive this is an acceptable solution. Vote Astorino. The monster must go!!

@Dale Gribble, #11: “… and volunteer to keep watch at the local prison!”
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You want to keep watch at your local prison? You couldn’t handle “keeping watch” at your local prison. LOL.

OMalley and Gillibrand? Hasn’t our country suffered enough over the past 8 years under the liberals? Neither of the two have accomplished anything of substance while in office.
Liberals = America’s Demise
Progressives are progressively destroying our country

Dale, also, if they actually cut the State workforce by 50%, would you complain about the inconvenience and waste of your time, as you sat in the queque, waiting for services? And what would you say about the missive bill for overtime? And how about the effect that it would have on working families? A lot to consider, before suggesting that solution.

@Saratoga Speaks: I am all but 100% sure that the members of the Moreland Commission were guaranteed indemnification for any actions they performed during their tenure on the Commission. Only a fool would have signed on without that guarantee, as it would leave them vulnerable to harassment lawsuits from anyone who ends up indicted due to the evidence they collected, and any statements they made or still make. Especially anyone who was acquitted of those charges.

Is Soares considering filing his own charges against those that were found to have violated the laws of the State, county or municipality? Or has some plot been hatched to file charges in Albany County, that they have figured out will give a valid claim of double jeopardy, if any other Federal or State entity tries to indict? Something’s rotten in Albany County me thinks.

The question is, why hasn’t Silver suffered the same penalties as Kellner, for his activities in the Lopez scandal, and silent coverup attempt, in the Assembly? Silver, if Lopez hadn’t been reported for his perversion, would have let business go on as usual, with his tacit approval. Shelly, may the Preet be with you, you lowlife.